


Teles

by Crescense



Category: Sleepy Hollow (1999)
Genre: F/M, Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-08-17
Updated: 2019-08-17
Packaged: 2020-09-06 05:07:47
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 629
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20285899
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Crescense/pseuds/Crescense
Summary: In a dream Katrina receives a visit from Ichabod's mother.





	Teles

~•●•~

* * *

Katrina had only to pass through the snowy orchard before she would reach the cabin. Within its frame she would find her mother as she had found her so many times before. The room in which she inhabited would be glowing and warmed by fire. Busy she would be at the flames, cooking, drawing, dreaming. The fire could be seen already beyond the blue-white snow, beyond the forest.

Trailing Katrina were mists, ghosts, trailing her as she ran through snow and between the trunks of apple trees whose bare branches were twisted and dark against the sky. Mother was simultaneously behind and in front of her, waiting in the cabin and in the future speaking after death. She was aware of her passing in a room of youth, warm and glowing with fire. _Hold my hand. I'm here, for this moment._

_Katrina._

The memories of her mother's smile swayed the daughter to believe in her presence. All she needed was to reach out and she'd find her in the darkness beyond the field of snow. Find her as she found Ichabod before, in a room of warmth clouded with souls. A pitcher of tepid water clouded with ink. His lightness, his spirit stood out to her blinded eyes. Such as a magnet she was borne to those she was meant to find.

Theodore, Mary, they came to her. Steps placed, not made.

In darkness she met mother, met her hands, then the hands were not hers. They belonged to another woman. One with whom Katrina was not acquainted, though she knew not to fear her. This woman was with magic; it surrounded her as an aura.

_Katrina_, she whispered.

She wore red, dark red in a scene of white. Low satin. The woman's eyes glistened with secrets. She needed to confide, to pour into another some of what was spilling over from inside. This girl, this wisp, she believed was the same; secrets kept. Both had lost everyone but the man who did not always allow himself to hear their whispers in his sleep.

Katrina was the same as this woman. She'd always belonged to another world. Sisters in their beliefs, sisters in their sharing of Ichabod's heart. For whether or not Katrina had intended it, Ichabod's heart was caged. And in the realms of the living, she bore the title as its sole owner. From the meeting of their eyes was this destined, was this passed. The ink on the scroll still wet but locking. A part of him signed away. The scroll burned; made ash, made air; inhaled unknowingly by the girl, by Katrina in the dark woods. Of the dark woods and ash._ Write it in the ash of flames. Write it and it will come true,_ so she'd hoped. So she hoped still.

The woman grasped her hand in the cradle of her palm, rocking from the wrist then still.

_My daughter, my heart. Protect my boy. You are his missing strength. You complete him._

_He completes me,_ she confided, closing her eyes, falling back, falling into the woven maze, the petals. Into the memories. _I will protect him with my dying breath._

The woman took hold of her hands; the hands Katrina did not know she'd let hover above her heart, framing it. She placed her hands to the fabric over her skin. Her eyes met Katrina's, warm and gentle, and Katrina knew her for who she was. She saw in her the spirit of her son, and embraced her not only for herself but for the other being who had taken refuge within her; the man she would tomorrow call her husband.

She looked to the snow at her feet and witnessed her white dress change to red, blossomed as if with blood.

* * *

~•●•~


End file.
